The Global Sexual Revolution: Destruction of Freedom in the Name of Freedom - by Gabriele Kuby

In CWR 

German sociologist Gabriele Kuby has been warning the public about threats to society and dangers to the Catholic Faith for years. She has warned of the excesses of the cultural revolution of 1968, offered a critique of the ideology of feminism, and warned of the destructive effects of the sexual revolution. But what makes her especially qualified to speak about such matters is that she herself was a revolutionary soixante-huitard before converting to the Catholic Faith in 1997. 

Born in Konstanz, Germany, in 1944, Kuby studied sociology in Berlin and completed her Master’s degree in Konstanz under Ralf Dahrendorf in the late 1960s. For several decades before her conversion, she dabbled in esoteric material and worked as a translator and interpreter. Her first book, Mein Weg zu Maria—Von der Kraft lebendigen Glaubens (My Way to Maria—by the Power of the Living Faith), published by Bertelsmann Verlag in 1998, is a diary of her encounter with Christ and her life-changing conversion. 

Since then she has published ten other books about faith and spirituality, the 1968 cultural revolution, feminism, gender and sexuality, and how to find hope through a reaffirmation of Christian values. 

Kuby is a frequent lecturer in Germany and around Europe, and has written for numerous print and on-line publications in Europe, including the Die Tagespost in Germany, Vatican Magazin in Germany, and www.kath.net. She has also been a guest on talk shows aired by German public service broadcasters ARD and ZDF, as well as global television network EWTN. 

In 2012, Kuby’s latest book, Die globale sexuelle Revolution: Zerstörung der Freiheit im Namen der Freiheit (The Global Sexual Revolution: Destruction of Freedom in the Name of Freedom), was published by Fe-Medienverlag in 2012. Recently, she spoke with Catholic World Report about her book, her work, and today’s dangerous challenges to the Faith. 

CWR: What has most influenced your intellectual development? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: My lifelong search for truth. My father, Erich Kuby, was a left-wing writer and journalist. That set me on the path of the 1968 student rebellion and eventually led to the study of sociology in West Berlin. But to me, neither Communism nor feminism, nor the sexual revolution, was convincing—especially given the gap between human reality and the ideals proclaimed by these groups. So I soon moved on. 

After a direct experience of God in 1973, I began to search for God on paths where you can’t find Him: esoterics and psychology. For twenty years I worked as a translator in these fields. And I moved through the ideological currents of our time—which made it very difficult to walk through the door of the Church and discover the treasures she offers. But eventually, in 1997, I did. Since then, I have been writing books on spiritual matters and socio-political issues. 

CWR: Last September, you published The Global Sexual Revolution: Destruction of Freedom in the Name of Freedom.Why did you write this book? What has been the response?

 

Gabriele Kuby: After my conversion, it became increasingly clear to me that the deregulation of sexual norms is at the front lines of today’s cultural war. So, in 2006, I published my first book on the topic: Gender Revolution: Relativism in Action. This was, in fact, one of the first books to shed light on a hidden agenda. 

As I continued to watch developments in our society, I felt a need to show the whole picture. This is what I have tried to do in The Global Sexual Revolution. 

 

The book has had three editions within a few months, although the mainstream media have ignored it. In German we have the expression totschweigen, which means “silencing something to death.” But it doesn’t seem to have worked! The book has been published in Poland and Croatia, and will be published in Hungary and Slovakia this autumn. And there are ongoing negotiations with publishers in other countries, too. 

On September 31, 2012, I had the privilege of putting the book into the hands of Pope Benedict XVI, who then said to me, “Thank God that you speak and write.” This is a great encouragement! 

CWR: What is the main message of the book? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: That the deregulation of sexual norms leads to the destruction of culture. Why? Because, as established in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, the family is the basic unit of society—and it needs some basic moral conditions in which to thrive. 

But children—brought up today in a hyper-sexualized society in which they themselves are sexualized by the entertainment industry, the media, and mandatory school programs—are increasingly unable to become mature adults that are up to the demands of marriage, and the obligations of responsible fatherhood and motherhood. 

Furthermore, such a hyper-sexualized society cannot do without contraception and abortion. And the outcome of all this is the “culture of death,” a term coined by John Paul II.

CWR: Your book is subtitled, The Destruction of Freedom in the Name of Freedom. What do you mean by that? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: In the wake of the dictatorships of the 20^th century, and after a few centuries of the philosophical glorification of the individual, the highest value in our time is “freedom.” The deregulation of sexual norms has been “sold” to people as part of this freedom. 

But what happens if you do not control and master the sexual drive? You become a slave of that powerful drive—a sex addict who is constantly on the prowl for sexual satisfaction. And as Plato already showed 2,400 years ago, this leads to tyranny. 

Of course, this is all a rather complex process. But a simple thought can make it readily apparent: If people live in a culture where they lose sight of self-giving love—and, instead, use each other for sexual satisfaction—they will use others for anything that satisfies their needs. The only limits will be determined by how much power an individual has. And the ensuing social chaos produced by such sexual deregulation eventually calls for ever more control by the state. 

CWR: But doesn’t real freedom mean being able to live without any rules, norms, mores, or laws?

 

Gabriele Kuby: Freedom is, indeed, a fundamental human value. The freedom of the will is one of the essential differences between man and animals. Even God respects our freedom and allows us to destroy ourselves—and our world. 

But freedom can only be realized if it is related to truth—the truth of man, the truth of the relationship, the truth of the situation. Jesus says “the truth will set you free” (John 8:32). Freedom depends on people who take responsibility for the consequences of their actions on themselves and on others. 

In every society, the achievement and preservation of freedom is a battle that can only be fought by mature human beings—people who have realized an inner freedom within themselves. The idea that “freedom” means the ability to do what we like is adequate for a three-year-old child but not for those beyond that age. 

CWR: In Chapter XV, you say: “Man is born an egoist. But he must be taught virtue.” Can you elaborate on this?

 

Gabriele Kuby: A new-born baby cries when he feels any dissatisfaction; and for a year or two, parents should, as best they can, give the baby the experience of Paradise: immediate and total satisfaction. But very soon, as the child grows up, he leaves that Paradise and has to learn that there are other people around him who also have needs, and that there is good and bad in the world—this, the child knows intrinsically. 

This means that the ability to choose good requires self-control—and the ability to renounce small satisfactions in order to achieve a greater aim. Sociologists call this a “deferred gratification pattern.” But it must be learned or taught in children. And more than anything else, children learn from the example of their parents, whatever that example may be. Lucky are those children who learn virtue by the virtuous example of their parents. 

CWR: You make extensive references to Aldous Huxley’s 1931 classic, Brave New World. Why? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: It’s amazing to read Huxley’s prophetic work today! In Brave New World, people are produced in bottles; they are collectively conditioned to be “happy” by the media and psycho-pharmaceuticals; children entertain themselves with sex, like everybody else; and everything is controlled by “Ford (Our Lord).” 

While Huxley had originally conceived of his utopia 600 years into the future, by 1949 he saw it happening within a century. At that time there was no artificial insemination, no prenatal selection, no surrogate mothers, no genetic manipulation, no “parent 1” and “parent 2.” But it took less than fifty years for all that “progress” to occur! 

For Huxley, there was no reason why the new totalitarianism should resemble the old. He was aware that a dictator will give more sexual freedom—the more political and economic freedom is restricted. He knew that the real revolution happens “in the souls and bodies of people.” 

CWR: How is it that human beings have gained so many new rights but have also lost so much dignity?

 

Gabriele Kuby: We have not created ourselves nor can we create life. If we lose awareness that we have received our life from God, and that He has made us in His image and endowed us with an immortal soul, then we lose our dignity. And Man then succumbs to the temptation of “improving” man through genetic manipulation, and by discarding human beings at the beginning and end of life ad libitum. 

 

We protect the copyrights of authors with quite fierce laws. Let us also protect the copyright of God for the creation of man. It could save us from many man-made problems. 

CWR: So are we in a crisis–of civilization, of the family, or of belief? Where do its roots lie?

 

Gabriele Kuby: Sometimes at my talks I ask the audience to raise their hands if they think life for our children will be better, say, thirty years from now. Hardly any hands go up. We have this strange phenomenon in which people feel the crisis we are in, but they largely seem to be blind to the evil that brings it about. 

The cultural revolution of 1968 brought many ideas and social movements to their apogee. It attacked the Christian values to which the European culture owes its amazing flourishing—that is, its family-sustaining values, which even the Nazis and the Communists were unable to eradicate completely. 

CWR: Can you elaborate on the significance of the 1968 cultural revolution? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: The cultural revolution of 1968, brought about by the well-groomed bourgeois student generation of that time who had nothing to complain about, united three revolutionary impulses. First, young people became enthralled with Communist theory at a time when Berlin was divided by a wall and Russian tanks had rolled into Prague. Second, they also followed the call of radical feminist Simone de Beauvoir and others “to get out of the slavery of motherhood” and, above all, propagated—and lived—“sexual liberation.” Finally, there was a philosophical impulse that came from the Frankfurter School, which was made up of people like Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, and Herbert Marcuse. 

The poisonous temptation was: If you “liberate” your sexuality—that is, if you tear down all moral restrictions—you can build a society free of repression. For more simple—and hippie—minds, this was condensed into the slogan, “Make love, not war (and take drugs).” 

The academically trained generation of 1968 realized that they could not mobilize the masses, least of all the “proletariat,” so they set out to “march through the institutions.” And this actually brought them into eventual positions of power in politics, media, the universities, and the judiciary. 

The goals of 1968 are now being realized through institutions like the United Nations and the European Union, and through left-wing—and even some “conservative”—governments, in unison with the powerful support of the mainstream media. 

CWR: The Brussels-based analyst Marguerite Peeters has also written about the globalization of this revolution. How is this happening?

 

Gabriele Kuby: Marguerite A. Peeters' 2007 book The Globalization of the Western Cultural Revolution was an eye-opener to me. I focus on the core of this revolution, which involves the deregulation of the moral norms of sexuality. 

This global sexual revolution is now being carried out by power elites. These include international organizations like the United Nations and the European Union, with their web of inscrutable sub-organizations; global corporations like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft; the big foundations like Rockefeller and Guggenheim; extremely rich individuals like Bill and Melinda Gates, Ted Turner, Georges Soros, and Warren Buffett; and non-governmental organizations like the International Planned Parenthood Federation and the International Lesbian and Gay Association. 

All of these actors operate at the highest levels of power with huge financial resources. And they all share one interest: to reduce population growth on this planet. Abortion, contraception, the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) agenda, the destruction of the family—all serve this one aim. 

However, this doesn’t satisfactorily explain why, for example, an ideologue like American theorist Judith Butler—who wants to destroy the identity of man and woman in order to undermine society through a political strategy of “gender mainstreaming”—is considered a philosopher laureate by these elites. But it perhaps does suggest a hidden agenda of the new world order. 

CWR: What exactly is “gender mainstreaming”?

 

Gabriele Kuby: The term “gender” was introduced into official documents at the UN’s International Conference on Population and Development in 1994 held in Cairo, Egypt, and at the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995 held in Beijing, China. The idea was to create the linguistic vehicle for a new ideology. “Gender” was to replace the term “sex” in the sense of referring to the binary sexual order of man and woman. Then radical feminist ideas and the LGBT agenda united and gave birth to the idea of “gender mainstreaming.” 

The term “gender” implies that a person’s sexual identity need not necessarily be identical to that person’s biological sex. It breaks down the binary male-female sexual nature of human beings. 

This dissolution of the binary sexual nature of man and woman serves two primary purposes: First, it aims to destroy the so-called “gender hierarchy” between man and woman. In other words, there are—according to gender theory—not two but many gender identities, which can include lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transsexual men and women. Second, it aims to dissolve heterosexuality as the norm. This gender-based conception of man and woman aims to enter the mainstream of society—and, indeed, this is already happening at an incredible speed ! 

CWR: What role does pornography play in what you have diagnosed?

 

Gabriele Kuby: Pornography plays a huge part in the revolution. Maybe it is a kind of male revenge for the feminist war against men. People who drug themselves regularly with pornography lose sight of love, the family, the ability to become a father and mother. They become addicted and many end up on a slippery slope into the criminal use of sex. The alarming fact is that pornography has become “normal” for young people: 20% of teenage boys in Germany look at pornography daily; 42% view it once a week. What kind of people will they become? 

It is hard to understand why the EU fights so aggressively against pollution through smoking but not against pollution through pornography. The latter is more serious because it destroys the family. One cannot get rid of the images in one’s mind, even if one wants to. 

CWR: In Chapter V, you focus on the Yogyakarta Principles. What are they? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: The Yogyakarta Principles [on the Application of International Human Rights Law in Relation to Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity] were formulated by a group of so-called human rights experts meeting in the Indonesia town of Yogyakarta. They were then presented to the world in March 2007 at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. 

This media event gave the world the impression that it was an official UN document. It is not! But if you do a quick search on the internet, you will be amazed to see how many governments, parties, and organizations are behind it. 

I devoted a whole chapter to this document because it clearly illustrates the totalitarian drive of the LGBT agenda. For example, Principle 29 calls for the establishment of “independent and effective institutions and procedures to monitor the formulation and enforcement of laws and policies to ensure the elimination of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.” This means that a super-structure above the level of the nation-state should be established to reorganize and control the whole of society towards the privileges of the LGBT movement. 

I urge people to take a minute and read the Yogyakarta Principles—or at least just this one Principle 29—in order to get a sense of the document’s totalitarian agenda. 

CWR: Values like tolerance and diversity seem to have been appropriated to further this agenda.

 

Gabriele Kuby: The essential values of our time—freedom, justice, equality, non-discrimination, tolerance, dignity, and human rights—have been abused, distorted and manipulated by the cultural revolutionaries. 

In much the same way that an embryo is manipulated, the nucleus or core has been taken out of these honorable concepts and filled with something entirely new. One of the chapters in my book is called “The Political Rape of Language” and it considers this phenomenon. 

We must remember that the function of language is to communicate truth. So it is, in fact, very dangerous to corrupt language in the service of political mass manipulation. Throughout history, every totalitarian system has corrupted language in their efforts to manipulate people. Recall that the main Russian newspaper was called Pravda or “truth.” Sadly, in today’s media age, the opportunities to do this are much more sophisticated. 

CWR: Philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre has written that concepts like virtue, beauty, and truth have lost their meaning in the modern world. How can we talk of such things in a world in which they are no longer understood? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: I don’t believe they are not understood. The problem is the cultural revolution which aims at destroying their content—and our cowardliness in failing to stand up for them. 

The very reason why the LGBT movement is becoming more totalitarian is that it recognizes that man has a conscience, that man yearns for love, and that he seeks truth, beauty, and goodness. Therefore, everything which tends to wake up man’s conscience must be eliminated. 

Thus, children must be programmed and sexualized in kindergarten so that they may lose their natural ability to distinguish between good and evil, and lose their natural inner orientation towards the good. 

CWR: John Paul II never shied away from speaking of the sexual nature of man and the beauty of the conjugal union. How do you understand his vision?

 

Gabriele Kuby: John Paul II gave the Church a great treasure with his “Theology of the Body,” and with the wealth of encyclicals and letters concerning the integrated vision of the human person—in body, soul, and spirit. In this time of great confusion, his is a light that shines into our minds, our hearts, our bedrooms. 

If God is love, and if we are called to be fellow citizens for God (Ephesians 2:19), then it follows that in this life we need to learn to love. The most intimate and all-encompassing expression of that love is the sexual union of man and woman out of which a new human being can arise. 

The modern world has reduced this sexual union to bodily satisfaction, and in so doing, it has separated body and soul. We already have a word for the permanent separation of body and soul—that is ‘death.’ By reducing sex to the level of the body—that is, the animal level—we have created a “culture of death.” 

We need to re-learn that sex is an expression of self-giving, of life-giving love. This would lead to a recovery of our terribly sick society. 

CWR: What is the “new anthropology” that you mention in Chapter X?

 

Gabriele Kuby: Pope Benedict XVI gave a very enlightening speech as part of his Christmas Greetings to the Curia and the Cardinals on December 21, 2012. He spoke then of the “anthropological revolution” of our time, pointing to the “attack we are currently experiencing on the true structure of the family” in the form of a false understanding of man’s sexual nature. 

If man denies that he is created as man and woman in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), and that his sex is a “given element of nature,” and that he is called to love and to give life, then the root of human existence is being destroyed. The “new anthropology” refers to this conception of man. 

CWR: How would you describe yourself? Do you consider yourself a cultural critic, an intellectual historian, or a sociologist of religion?

 

Gabriele Kuby: People keep calling me a “prophet.” But I don’t, of course, compare myself with such giants—and I don’t particularly like the way they normally died! But as far as the inner obligation goes to speak the truth, no matter what, I feel I am part of their extended family. 

CWR: How should faithful Christians respond to the global sexual revolution? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: That, of course, is the big question for each and every one of us. Whether we like it or not, each of us must tidy up our own sexual life and order it according to the call for true, faithful, life-giving love. If we don’t, we will not see clearly—and we will have no motivation or power to participate in the ongoing battle. It is a battle for the dignity of man, for the family, for our children, for the future. Ultimately, it is a battle for the Kingdom of God. 

God wants us to live. Jesus says, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). There are many encouraging developments in Europe—stories of resistance to the global sexual revolution coming out of France, Lithuania, Russia, Hungary, Norway, and Croatia. But we need a strong, courageous movement in every country of people who are still able to recognize that 2 + 2 = 4; that is: that the eradication of sexual norms destroys the person, the family, and the culture. 

CWR: Do you think we can succeed? 

 

Gabriele Kuby: Let us not worry about success. We are working for a good cause now; our lives are worthwhile. The ultimate success is in the hands of God.

L'amore? Si è liquefatto - di Massimo Introvigne

In NBQ

Il successo planetario del libro della sociologa israeliana Eva Illouz «Perché l'amore fa soffrire», che ho a suo tempo recensito su «La nuova Bussola quotidiana», ha spinto molti altri intellettuali a interrogarsi sulla crisi dell'amore dopo il Sessantotto, e le case editrici ci hanno costruito sopra una piccola industria. Sempre su queste colonne abbiamo parlato dell'intelligente risposta alla Illouz di un filosofo coreano che insegna in Germania, Byung-Chul Han, nel suo libro «Eros in agonia». Non poteva mancare la voce dell'archistar della sociologia, il polacco Zygmunt Bauman, di cui il Mulino ha appena tradotto «Gli usi postmoderni del sesso», mentre in inglese è uscita una nuova edizione del suo classico «Amore liquido».

La nozione di Bauman di «società liquida» fu citata anche da Benedetto XVI. È una società dove non ci sono più relazioni solide, stabili, ma tutto è effimero e tutto si cambia. La maggioranza cambia lavoro, casa, città più e più volte nella vita, e perfino nel calcio i giocatori «bandiera» che passano tutta la carriera nella stessa squadra sono una specie in via di estinzione. Le statistiche ci dicono che in Occidente più della metà delle persone cambia anche marito o moglie, non perché resta vedovo ma perché divorzia. Quanto ai molti che non si sposano - la maggioranza in diversi Paesi - cambiano compagno e compagna ancora più spesso. Anche l'amore è diventato «liquido», sostiene Bauman: «perché dovrei continuare a tenermi lo stesso partner quando ho già cambiato tre telefonini?». «Ciò che prima era considerata eresia del libertinismo, piuttosto che disturbo sessuale o perversione, ora diventa la norma culturale con l'autosufficienza dell'erotismo, ovvero con la libertà di cercare il piacere sessuale fine a se stesso».

Anche Bauman, come Eva Illouz, fa risalire la rivoluzione nei rapporti amorosi al Sessantotto, e in genere agli anni 1960 e al consumismo, cui le ideologie sessantottine hanno fatto un grande favore eliminando i freni morali alla pandemia del consumo. Così il rapporto amoroso diventa «quello tipico fra clienti e servizi, consumatori e merci». Non c'entra la prostituzione ma un modo di vivere le persone e l'amore come viviamo le cose: nessuno, nota Bauman, giura fedeltà all'automobile, al computer o alle azioni che ha comprato in borsa. Questo avviene, naturalmente, perché quello che chiamiamo «amore» si è ridotto al rapporto sessuale. L'amore di per sé non sarebbe «liquido»: richiederebbe per esistere un rapporto permanente e stabile, nella buona e nella cattiva sorte, una disponibilità a vivere insieme anche i momenti difficili e dolorosi. L'amore «liquido», ridotto a soddisfazione sessuale con una spruzzata di sentimento, invece è per sua natura effimero: so che lo cambierò, come l'automobile, quando troverò un modello migliore o quando comincerà a perdere colpi.

Liberazione? Bauman teme di essere accusato di moralismo e, da buon sociologo, non propone giudizi di valore. Fa notare però i costi enormi, a fronte dei presunti benefici, che l'amore «liquido» porta con sé. La Illouz ha ragione, le donne patiscono il nuovo «amore» più degli uomini, ma il femminismo ha creato una certa reciprocità. Posso sentirmi molto libero se posso trattare il partner come un cellulare, da cambiare appena ne trovo uno migliore. Ma so che il partner mi tratta nello stesso modo. Di qui una continua insicurezza, che travolge anche il sesso: se la mia performance non è ottimale, so già che la mia compagna o compagno mi rottamerà e si rivolgerà altrove. Le statistiche sui divorzi mostrano che neppure il matrimonio vince l'insicurezza. Altro che libertà sessuale...

Due postille meritano di essere aggiunte. La prima è che in una recente intervista Bauman ha suggerito che il Sesamo della sicurezza si aprirebbe con la parola magica di un amore fedele, stabile e non legato alla soddisfazione e alla prestazione. Ma dubita che questo sia ancora possibile oggi. La seconda postilla è che in «Amore liquido» Bauman sostiene che, sapendo che il mio partner mi tratta come un oggetto di consumo e potrò essere rottamato in qualunque momento, fino a ieri dovevo guardare in cagnesco come potenziali concorrenti solo le persone del mio stesso sesso. Oggi non è più così: il mio partner è esposto a un bombardamento di messaggi che lo o la persuadono che va sperimentata anche l'omosessualità e tutti diventano dunque mie concorrenti, senza distinzione di sesso. I media ripetono a tutti quello che, parlando di omosessualità, in una famosa intervista il giornalista gay Signorini disse a Berlusconi: «Tu non sai cosa ti perdi». Se poi - lo aggiungo io, non Bauman - dicessi alla persona con cui divido la vita, citandole il Catechismo della Chiesa Cattolica, che le relazioni omosessuali sono oggettivamente disordinate e  il disordine non dà mai la vera felicità, dovrei stare bene attento a no farmi sentire da nessuno. Le leggi sull'omofobia incombono.

Galli Della Loggia, historiador ex-comunista, denuncia la «revolución anticristiana» en Europa hoy

In RL  

“Una gran revolución se acerca en silencio a su fin en Europa. Una revolución de la mentalidad y de las costumbres colectivas que marca una gran ruptura con el pasado: la revolución anti-religiosa. Una revolución que golpea indiscriminadamente al hecho religioso en sí de cualquier confesión, pero que por razones históricas, y en concreto hablando de Europa, se presenta como una revolución esencialmente anticristiana”.

Así comienza un artículo escrito en la primera página de Il Corriere della Sera por Ernesto Galli della Loggia, intelectual laico italiano no conocido precisamente por sus posiciones conservadoras.

Por su interés y actualidad, ReL recoge en este reportaje las principales partes de este artículo de opinión.

Galli della Loggia es uno de los muchos intelectuales laicos italianos que se ha desvinculado del coro de acusaciones contra la Iglesia “oscurantista” que asola hoy en día el continente.

“Las iglesias cristianas no sólo han sido expulsadas progresivamente en casi todas partes de cualquier esfera pública mínimamente relevante, [...] sino que, a diferencia de las demás religiones, en la actualidad es legítimo dirigir las ofensas más graves y los insultos más sangrientos contra el cristianismo”, se lamenta.

El historiador y periodista hace un variado elenco de las diferentes ofensas que la religión cristiana está recibiendo en Europa:  

» En Irlanda, las iglesias están obligadas a alquilar sus propias salas de celebraciones, incluso para bodas entre homosexuales;

» en Roma, durante el concierto del 1 de Mayo, el cantante imitó el gesto de la consagración durante la Eucaristía pero con un preservativo entre sus manos en lugar de la hostia sagrada;

» en Dinamarca, el Parlamento ha aprobado una ley que exige a la Iglesia Evangélica Luterana  celebrar matrimonios entre personas del mismo sexo a pesar de que una tercera parte de sus ministros se hayan manifestado en contra;

» en Escocia dos obsétricas católicas fueron obligadas por un tribunal a participar en abortos realizado por sus compañeros; el colegio oficial de médicos británicos ha determinado que deben estar preparados para dejar de lado sus creencias personales con respecto a algunos aspectos controvertidos;

» en un vídeo reciente de David Bowie, aparece una escena en la que un sacerdote, después de golpear a un mendigo, entra en un burdel y seduce a una monja con estigmas en sus manos; en Inglaterra, se le ha prohibido a una enfermera llevar una cruz en el cuello durante horas de trabajo,

» una pequeña imprenta ha tenido que enfrentarse a acciones legales por negarse a imprimir material sexualmente explícito encargado por una revista gay; en Francia, de acuerdo con la legislación vigente, es prácticamente imposible para los cristianos manifestar públicamente que las relaciones sexuales entre personas del mismo sexo constituye un pecado según su religión”.

Y así sucesivamente en una avalancha de casos impresionantes que se pueden consultar en el sitio web intoleranceagainstchristians.eu.

Galli della Loggia es leído siempre con atención en El Vaticano, dicen. Su esposa es Lucetta Scaraffia, historiadora, y escribe a menudo en L´Osservatore Romano. Mantiene una estrecha amistad con su director, Giovanni Maria Vian.

Precisamente de este periódico, entre otros, ha extraído los numerosos ejemplos de discriminación comentados anteriormente. “Es más que suficiente para despertar el interés de cualquier conciencia liberal”, afirma Galli della Loggia.

“En este caso no se trata tanto de la Cristiandad, la Iglesia o la religión, sino de algo mucho más importante: se trata de la libertad. Y de la historia. De la conciencia de que libertad religiosa en Europa ha representado históricamente el origen (y condición) de todas las libertades civiles y políticas”, advierte el historiador.

“Ser absolutamente libre de adorar al propio Dios, de propagar la fe, de guardar los mandamientos, de adherirse a la visión del mundo y al sentido de la existencia que estos definen, de practicar públicamente el culto; pero también, por supuesto, de tener la libertad de no tener Dios ni religión: así se ha comenzado el camino de la libertad Europa. ¿Hay que recordar que ha sido el Dios cristiano?”.

Por último, el periodista e historiador concluye: “La libertad religiosa por un lado y la libertad de opinión y de expresión por otro –que son los dos pilares de la libertad política- van al unísono. Desde este punto de vista, es aún más preocupante el hecho de que hoy en día, en Europa, en muchos lugares y de muchas maneras, la libertad de los cristianos parezca objetivamente en peligro de extinción”.
Puede consultar el artículo completo en Il Corriere della Sera aquí.

Revolucionarios - Juan Manuel de Prada

Inquirido por Tatiana G. Rivas por sus «referentes morales», el alcalde Gordillo mete en el ajo a Cristo, en tan grata compañía como la del Che Guevara, Hugo Chávez y Fidel Castro (más Gandhi, que es el perejil buenista de todas las salsas), en un batiburrillo característico del hombre con empanada mental.

Esta manía de meter a Cristo en el guiso revolucionario es abuso muy arraigado entre todos los que quieren alcanzar el Paraíso en la Tierra, que es exactamente lo que Cristo jamás prometió. Castellani sitúa el origen de este abuso cuando un socialista pelmazo le dijo a Donoso Cortés: «Jesucristo fue el primer revolucionario del mundo». A lo que respondió el gran pensador español: «Pero Jesucristo no derramó más sangre que la suya».

A juicio de Castellani, Donoso le tendría que haber escrachado al socialista la cara de un sopapo, «librándolo a él de un error y librando a la humanidad para siempre de esa necedad de empastelar los conceptos». Ahora, con la primavera de la democracia que nos ha traído internet, esta necedad te la suelta cualquier andoba: pones en el Google la frase de aquel socialista pelmazo y en un santiamén el algoritmo te detecta a más de dos millones de tíos con las meninges empasteladas por los planes de la LOGSE o las misas guitarreras repitiendo como papagayos la misma necedad. Pero lo cierto es que Cristo vino a reconciliar consigo todo lo que existe en la tierra y en cielo, por la sangre de su cruz; lo que, mirado con las anteojeras de la política, más bien parece oficio de restaurador que de revolucionario. Y quizá aquí se halle la principal diferencia entre restauradores y revolucionarios: pues las restauraciones se hacen con sangre propia; y las revoluciones con sangre ajena, que sale mucho más barata.

Pero el alcalde Gordillo tampoco quiere que llegue la sangre al río. De momento, ya que no está de su mano multiplicar los panes y los peces, se conforma con asaltar supermercados, porque -según dice- «hemos tocado la tecla que molesta»; y afirma que seguirá haciéndolo «si no hacen nada para remediarlo». Esta indeterminación semántica es también muy propia del revolucionario: toca la tecla que molesta (¿a quiénes?), amenaza con seguir tocándola si no hacen nada por remediarlo (¿quiénes?), etcétera. Y esto es lo que más nos acojona de los revolucionarios, porque de inmediato intuimos que en esa instancia indeterminada se incluye todo quisque, desde la cajera del Mercadona al banquero. Fuera de esa instancia genérica de réprobos antirrevolucionarios, se encuentra... «la gente»:

-Yo vivo con la gente. Estoy con ellos en todo momento- afirma Gordillo.

Que es una casi paráfrasis paródica de aquella frase evangélica: «Yo estoy con vosotros todos los días hasta el fin del mundo». Al final del mundo, Cristo anunció que volvería en gloria y majestad, pero con Sánchez Gordillo asaltando supermercados ya no hace falta que venga, porque el Paraíso en la Tierra habrá quedado instaurado para siempre. El paraíso revolucionario es un supermercado donde puedes arramblar con todo lo que pilles sin pasar por caja (y sin que piten los detectores).

-Soy una persona cercana. Soy un referente moral para la gente -dice Sánchez Gordillo con proverbial modestia, aprovechando que su abuela no pasaba por allí cerca.

Como Castro, como el Che, como Cristo... Sánchez Gordillo no tiene edad para haber sufrido los planes de la LOGSE; pero apostaría el pescuezo a que de adolescente se chupó unas cuantas misas guitarreras, con el falso credo de Mejía Godoy sonando a todo trapo: «El romano imperialista, / puñetero y desalmado...».

"Indignados", la Quarta Rivoluzione - Massimo Introvigne

In La Bussola Quotidiana

Domani, sabato 15 ottobre, si svolge la giornata internazionale di mobilitazione degli "indignaods", e la manifestazione di Roma sarà il suo fulcro in Italia.

Ma chi sono gli "indignados" che scendono in piazza in Spagna, in Gran Bretagna, negli Stati Uniti, in Italia e la cui protesta sembra inarrestabile? Il nome viene da un libretto pubblicato nel 2010 in Francia da un piccolo editore (Indigène éditions di Montpellier) che si è trasformato in successo mondiale, Indignez-vous ! (Pour une insurrection pacifique) - trad. it., Indignatevi!, Add editore, Torino 2011 -, del vecchio (novantatré anni) ex militante della Resistenza francese, ambasciatore e uomo politico Stéphane Hessel. Questo nuovo "libretto rosso" di una rivoluzione fai da te è ampiamente sopravvalutato. Hessel attacca quella che in Italia siamo abituati a chiamare la "casta" - politici, industriali, Chiesa - ma i suoi critici fanno notare che ne ha sempre fatto parte. E il suo legame politico con Dominique Strauss-Kahn è diventato fonte d'imbarazzo dopo gli incidenti a sfondo sessuale che hanno coinvolto l'ex direttore generale del Fondo Monetario Internazionale.

Il contenuto, poi, è di una povertà desolante. Un critico davvero insospettabile, il giornalista del quotidiano di sinistra Libération Pierre Marcelle, ha chiamato Hessel «il Babbo Natale delle buone coscienze». Le trenta paginette che si vorrebbero anticonformiste di Indignatevi! sono in realtà un inno al più vieto conformismo politicamente corretto, e lasciano l'impressione che per superare la crisi in atto non ci sia bisogno di fare sacrifici. Basterebbe che i cattivi che si sono impadroniti della politica e dell'economia siano sostituiti da "buoni" dalle caratteristiche molto vaghe: leali, generosi, un po' antiamericani e anti-israeliani, fedeli ai "valori della Resistenza" - ci mancherebbe altro - e capaci di emozionarsi per i "nuovi diritti" rivendicati dalle femministe e dagli omosessuali.

I primi "indignados" - di qui il nome spagnolo - si sono manifestati il 15 maggio 2011 a Madrid. Come ha fatto notare il teologo spagnolo don Javier Prades-López a un convegno organizzato dal cardinale Angelo Scola a Venezia, gli "indignados" se la sono presa per prima cosa con la Chiesa e hanno finito pr contestare il Papa e la Giornata Mondiale della Gioventù. Questa è un'importante differenza sia con i vecchi no global, che non erano certo filocattolici ma che non avevano la Chiesa tra gli obiettivi principali, sia con le folle delle "primavere arabe", che anzi in parte, contestando dittature "laiche", chiedevano più e non meno religione.

L'aspetto anticattolico sottolineato da Prades-López e l'insistenza sui "nuovi diritti" non vanno in alcun modo sottovalutati. Ma ugualmente importante è la rivolta contro la politica in genere, contro la "casta" e l'idea che la crisi economica derivi da colpe individuali di singoli esponenti del mondo politico e finanziario, così che gli "indignados" non vogliono in nessun modo pagarne il costo. A Roma si è sentito rivendicare un «diritto all'insolvenza», a non pagare i debiti. A Londra si sono visti giovani sfasciare vetrine chiedendo non il pane - come in Tunisia -, ma il diritto al cellulare ultimo modello o all'abito di marca. A Parigi gli slogan contro tutti i partiti e gli inviti ad astenersi dal voto elettorale hanno turbato lo stesso Hessel, che ha sempre fatto politica di partito e che forse ora si è accorto di avere aperto un vaso di Pandora.

Ma per capire gli «indignados» non bastano gli analisti politici. Ci serve una teologia della storia. Papa Benedetto XVI ha parlato questo mese in Calabria della «mutazione antropologica» di una generazione che vive nella realtà virtuale di Internet e degli smartphone e rischia di perdere il contatto con il mondo reale. Il pensatore cattolico brasiliano Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira (1908-1995), nel suo grande affresco della scristianizzazione dell'Occidente, Rivoluzione e Contro-Rivoluzione (cfr. Rivoluzione e Contro-Rivoluzione. Edizione del cinquantenario, a cura di Giovanni Cantoni, Sugarco, Milano 2009), vedeva la Rivoluzione, con la "R" maiuscola, come un processo di progressiva distruzione dei legami sociali che avevano fatto dell'Occidente cristiano quello che era. Prima i legami religiosi, con la rottura con Roma del protestantesimo; poi i legami politici organici fondati sulla ricchezza dei corpi intermedi, sostituiti da un freddo rapporto fra il cittadino e lo Stato moderno, con la Rivoluzione francese; infine i legami economici, con il comunismo e l'assorbimento di tutta la vita economica nello Stato. Più tardi, Corrêa de Oliveira aggiunse alle prime tre fasi quella che chiamava Quarta Rivoluzione, che aveva il suo momento emblematico nel 1968 e non attaccava più legami macrosociali, ma microsociali - la famiglia, il legame fra madre e figlio con l'aborto - e perfino i legami dell'uomo con se stesso con la droga, l'ideologia di genere, l'eutanasia.

Il 1968 era tutto questo, ma la Terza Rivoluzione - quella comunista - era ancora così forte da riuscire largamente a recuperarlo. I no global - in parte professionisti del disordine, in parte nostalgici di forme arcaiche di marxismo - rappresentano la transizione fra un movimentismo di Terza e uno di Quarta Rivoluzione. Gli "indignados" sembrano essere insieme la causa e l'effetto di una Quarta Rivoluzione che ha portato alle estreme conseguenze lo spappolamento del corpo sociale, la solitudine di tutti da tutti, e contro tutti, il rifiuto di ogni responsabilità - ben simboleggiato dalla rivendicazione del diritto a non pagare i debiti e dagli insulti al Papa, in quanto richiama all'esistenza di doveri -, la mancanza assoluta di prospettive e, in fondo, anche di speranza. Ci volevano oltre quarant'anni di Quarta Rivoluzione perché le piazze potessero riempirsi di "indignados".

Si tratta di movimenti che sono stati sempre manipolati e riassorbiti da qualche demagogo politico. Avverrà anche questa volta? Si è candidato Beppe Grillo, che si è affrettato ad accorrere anche a Madrid ai primi segni di vita degli "indignados". E abbiamo visto emergere partiti paradossali, del nulla, intitolati alla pirateria informatica o, com'è appena avvenuto in Polonia, a una collezione raffazzonata di «nuovi diritti» tenuti insieme dall'anticlericalismo. Questi partiti non vincono le elezioni, ma è già inquietante che ottengano seggi ed entrino nei parlamenti.
Quanto ai politici tradizionali - compresi quelli di sinistra - sperano talora di sfruttare gli "indignados" ma ne ricavano principalmente uova marce. L'incomprensione, e le uova marce, spiegano perché la politica non solo non sia in grado di rispondere alle poche rivendicazioni sensate degli "indignados" - che sono di carattere economico immediato, ovvero denunciano lo scandalo reale di classi dirigenti che chiedono sacrifici cui non sono disponibili a partecipare di persona -, ma anche perché, intimidita, non sia neppure in grado di garantire l'ordine pubblico come dovrebbe fare quando le proteste degenerano in intollerabili violenze.

La presenza degli "indignados" dà ragione a Benedetto XVI: siamo di fronte a un degrado antropologico che spesso inizia con il manifestarsi come ostilità alla Chiesa e al cristianesimo. È certo necessaria una risposta di ordine pubblico alle frange violente, che non si lasci intimidire da nessuna retorica buonista. Ma affrontare seriamente il problema degli "indignados" significa operare con pazienza per ricostituire i legami sociali e personali spezzati da una lunga Rivoluzione. Per gli uomini e le donne di buona volontà - lo ha detto il Papa al Parlamento Federale tedesco - questo si chiama ritorno al diritto naturale, all'idea che esistono doveri e non solo diritti, a una chiara nozione del bene e del male. Per i cattolici, si chiama nuova evangelizzazione.

Christian Church facing a revolution that is shaking its foundations: the gay revolution

by Albert Mohler

August 17, 2011 (AlbertMohler.com) - The Christian church has faced no shortage of challenges in its 2,000-year history. But now it’s facing a challenge that is shaking its foundations: homosexuality.

To many onlookers, this seems strange or even tragic. Why can’t Christians just join the revolution?

And make no mistake, it is a moral revolution. As philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah of Princeton University demonstrated in his recent book, “The Honor Code,” moral revolutions generally happen over a long period of time. But this is hardly the case with the shift we’ve witnessed on the question of homosexuality.

In less than a single generation, homosexuality has gone from something almost universally understood to be sinful, to something now declared to be the moral equivalent of heterosexuality—and deserving of both legal protection and public encouragement. Theo Hobson, a British theologian, has argued that this is not just the waning of a taboo. Instead, it is a moral inversion that has left those holding the old morality now accused of nothing less than “moral deficiency.”

The liberal churches and denominations have an easy way out of this predicament. They simply accommodate themselves to the new moral reality. By now the pattern is clear: These churches debate the issue, with conservatives arguing to retain the older morality and liberals arguing that the church must adapt to the new one. Eventually, the liberals win and the conservatives lose. Next, the denomination ordains openly gay candidates or decides to bless same-sex unions.

This is a route that evangelical Christians committed to the full authority of the Bible cannot take. Since we believe that the Bible is God’s revealed word, we cannot accommodate ourselves to this new morality. We cannot pretend as if we do not know that the Bible clearly teaches that all homosexual acts are sinful, as is all human sexual behavior outside the covenant of marriage. We believe that God has revealed a pattern for human sexuality that not only points the way to holiness, but to true happiness.

Thus we cannot accept the seductive arguments that the liberal churches so readily adopt. The fact that same-sex marriage is a now a legal reality in several states means that we must further stipulate that we are bound by scripture to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman—and nothing else.

We do so knowing that most Americans once shared the same moral assumptions, but that a new world is coming fast. We do not have to read the polls and surveys; all we need to do is to talk to our neighbors or listen to the cultural chatter.

In this most awkward cultural predicament, evangelicals must be excruciatingly clear that we do not speak about the sinfulness of homosexuality as if we have no sin. As a matter of fact, it is precisely because we have come to know ourselves as sinners and of our need for a savior that we have come to faith in Jesus Christ. Our greatest fear is not that homosexuality will be normalized and accepted, but that homosexuals will not come to know of their own need for Christ and the forgiveness of their sins.

This is not a concern that is easily expressed in sound bites. But it is what we truly believe.

It is now abundantly clear that evangelicals have failed in so many ways to meet this challenge. We have often spoken about homosexuality in ways that are crude and simplistic. We have failed to take account of how tenaciously sexuality comes to define us as human beings. We have failed to see the challenge of homosexuality as a Gospel issue. We are the ones, after all, who are supposed to know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only remedy for sin, starting with our own.

We have demonstrated our own form of homophobia—not in the way that activists have used that word, but in the sense that we have been afraid to face this issue where it is most difficult . . . face to face.

My hope is that evangelicals are ready now to take on this challenge in a new and more faithful way. We really have no choice, for we are talking about our own brothers and sisters, our own friends and neighbors, or maybe the young person in the next pew.

There is no escaping the fact that we are living in the midst of a moral revolution. And yet, it is not the world around us that is being tested, so much as the believing church. We are about to find out just how much we believe the Gospel we so eagerly preach.